The Late Night Visitor
by MiLady Oakenshield
Summary: Molly Hooper shows up at Sherlock's flat at three in the morning, completely rain-soaked and depressed. One-shot.


It was nearly three o'clock in the morning when the bell started ringing.

At first it went completely unanswered because, really, who in their right mind rings someone so early? But the ringing kept droning on, and on, and on. Until, when the possibility of sleep was no longer an issue, an overly exhausted Sherlock Holmes finally threw off his covers, kicked his feet into a pair of slipper shoes and tossed on a bathrobe.

"Bloody hell," he muttered quietly as he threw open the door to his flat. He took the stairs two at a time, making each step onto the next one hard and loud. And then bell rang again. "Quit your incessant ringing already! I'm coming!"

Rubbing sleep from his eyes, Sherlock twisted open the doorknob and threw the door back.

"Molly Hooper?!"

To say he was a little surprised to see her, standing there, at his doorstep, was an understatement considering it was pouring rain and had been for a few hours now. He took in her physical state and deduced, by the amount of rain cascading off her body and the way her hair matted down around her neck at all sides, that she had been outside for some time. Dare he say, she walked here.

She stared at him for the longest time probably because she hadn't expected him to actually answer and had nothing to say now that he actually did. What she honest to God expected to happen was nothing; no one would answer, and she would slink back to her flat in shame for maybe thinking she'd get an answer. But someone did answer the door, and she had nothing.

Normally when no one would answer him, Sherlock would get irritated but something in him akin to sympathy washed through him at that very moment. "Get in here." He ushered the freezing wet pathologist inside and shut the door behind her.

He removed the robe from his shoulders and draped it around hers. Still saying nothing, they walked upstairs back to his flat and Sherlock urged the door open with his left hand. He steered her inside the flat then pulled the door closed behind them.

"Get out of your wet clothes," he said, then gestured to his bathroom and took the handed bathrobe as she paddled off.

Sherlock stood there for a total of five point three seconds before he gave his bathrobe a toss to an unoccupied chair. He fled to his bedroom and started pulling open random drawers; he didn't know why, really, considering he lacked efficient clothing for a woman. No woman ever spent the night at the flat—save for Mary, but she never left clothes behind and when she was over, he was almost always preoccupying himself with something else.

Sighing when he could find nothing and knew even bothering to look through -his- drawers was a completely pointless endeavor, Sherlock grabbed an overly long button-up then slammed his top drawer shut.

He walked out of his bedroom, to the bathroom and opened the door. "Put this on." He stuck the button-up through the door slit and held it in the air until it was grabbed from his fingers.

Turning, he went for John's bedroom—the army doctor was staying with Mary for the evening, hence the empty bed—and fluffed up the pillows then turned down the bed sheets.

"Thank you."

Sherlock looked over his shoulder. She was standing there in the button-up he gave her with her strawberry red hair damped and hanging loosely over her shoulders.

"I won't ask you to explain what happened, though I can deduce it for myself," he tugged a little at the blue sheets.

Molly said nothing to him; he was probably right, as he almost as was, but not talking about it was better than having him point out the details to her. So she moved past him to the bed and crawled under the covers.

Sherlock left the bedroom and returned to his own. Though he lay awake with his eyes at the ceiling, thinking. Why did he even care?

Less than hour later when sleep had finally reclaimed him again, he heard muffled screaming and moaning from John's bedroom. He jumped to his feet and immediately moved double time across the floor. He gave a small nudge to the door then peeked his head instead.

Molly was fidgeting under the covers. Something was uncomfortable to her. Going against his better judgment to leave her be, Sherlock pushed the door open the rest of the way and dropped to the left side of the bed.

"Molly," he called, and a hand fell to the area where her neck and shoulder met. Elevated pulse. Nightmare? "Molly!" He shook her a little until he eyes snapped open and her hand flew up to catch him in the face, though Sherlock had considered this and caught her wrist before she could smack him.

Her chest heaved. "I'm alright."

"No you're not. You were having a nightmare." It was a matter-of-fact statement that was hard to ignore when the idea was literally right there on the tip of his brain.

Without word, or asking for permission—which he hardly ever did, let's be honest here—Sherlock crawled in beside her. There was a bit of movement on her part before he cradled her to his chest and held her body tight against him until she stopped shaking.

Molly sighed as Sherlock pulled the covers around them both and breathed quite warmly into her hair. A soft red flushed her cheeks and neck. To be so close to him in such an intimate position was more than intoxicating. To feel him breathing on her, to hear his heart beating in her ear—it was soothing, and took her less than a second to fall asleep.

And Sherlock, well, he didn't sleep.

**This is my first Sherlock fanfiction. I JUST started watching the show and only finished season one so far. So if something seems off, just let me know. This was written on a small whim, hence why it's as short as it.**


End file.
